Published by K.I.M. Publishing ISBN 978-0-615-89505-5
Trade paperback, $15.95, 259 pages
Genre: Women's fiction
Plot: When Georgie Haydock returns to her home of Chimney Rock, North Carolina to help care for her mother who took a bad fall, she is bombarded with memories of home. When she was just six-years-old, her baby sister vanished from their home in the middle of the night. Her mother never recovered and insists that her daughter is out there somewhere.
Her mother has run up credit card debt buying up tracts of land hoping to sell them for a huge profit. The debt has endangered the family general store that has been their livelihood for years. And Georgie's first boyfriend, the rugged and handsome naturalist Ron Elliot she ran out on on years ago with no explanation, wants to rekindle their relationship.
My review: One of the reasons I enjoy reading is that a good story can take me places I've never been and make me feel like I am there. Senehi does just that with her seventh novel. The setting of the actual mountain town of Chimney Rock is a very real character in this story, and I fell in love with the tourist town and its quaint stores and townspeople who know everything about everybody. Anyone from a small town can relate to the wonderful scene where the older women prepare to make sandwiches for the emergency response team who are searching on the mountain for a missing person.
Fans of Nora Roberts' novels should pick up Dancing on Rocks, as Senehi mines similar territory and had gotten better with each successive book. There is a sweet romance between Georgie and Ron, and terrific family stories with Ron and his daughter and Georgie and her mother and sister and sister's sons. Every good novel has a secret and this one has a doozy- what really happened the night Georgie's sister disappeared?
The characters fascinated me, and I especially liked matriarch Dinah, even though her grief over her missing daughter caused her to treat her other daughters in an unthinking manner. She felt so real to me. Each of the characters are well drawn, they all have shade of gray instead of being stock good-or-bad characters.
Senehi discusses the extensive research she did for this novel in the acknowledgments section, which I found so interesting and greatly added to this captivating book. Anyone who likes nature and flora and fauna will get an added dimension of enjoyment to this novel, as Ron's work is also a big part of the story.
Reading Dancing on Rocks will have you heading for Trip Advisor to plan a visit to see this beautiful area of the country for yourself. And if you do, be sure to stop in to the cute little shops for some souvenirs.
rating 5 of 5
Oh I love books that make me want to visit the place in which the book is set!
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